Tag: employed

Solar Within City Limits

  • Tom O'Neill (in suit) develops new businesses for Exelon, an energy company best known for its fleet of nuclear power stations. The Chicago solar project is the company's largest to date. (Photo by Shawn Allee)

There’s a commercial-scale solar project
that’s getting some buzz in Chicago and
beyond. The builders promise to use up
some abandoned industrial space within
the city limits… and hope to provide
some local jobs. City governments across
the country like both of those ideas.
Shawn Allee looks at why this
urban solar project’s falling into place,
and whether it might get repeated across
the country:

Transcript

There’s a commercial-scale solar project
that’s getting some buzz in Chicago and
beyond. The builders promise to use up
some abandoned industrial space within
the city limits… and hope to provide
some local jobs. City governments across
the country like both of those ideas.
Shawn Allee looks at why this
urban solar project’s falling into place,
and whether it might get repeated across
the country:

Carrie Austin is a Chicago alderman, and, as she says, she’s constantly dealing with problems unique to Chicago. But she’s convinced she’s got one problem a lot other cities face, too: what to do with vacant industrial land. She’s got 200 acres of it in her neighborhood.

“The environmental issues left from the company, left us with such devastation without any regards to human life. That has been our fight all these years. ”

Austin says, even with some clean-up in recent years, it’s been tough getting someone to come in with some work – and jobs.

“We’ve talked to FedEx, Kinkos and many other corporate offices. Even to Wal-Mart, bringing some of their distrubution to such a large piece of land. But to no avail.”

Austin says there’s a portion of this land she’s not so worried about now. The energy company, Exelon, is putting up solar panels on about 40 acres. And for the first time in a long time, there’s the sound of new construction there.

“This site’s been vacant for thirty years.”

That’s Tom O’Neill – he develops new businesses for Exelon. We’re walking along a padded-down field of soil where there used to be factory walls, machines, and concrete floors.

“What’s changed is you don’t see the brush and the shrubbery and there was a building that used to be here. The whole site is now graded and you can see signs of the construction where the foundations are going to come out. If you look further west, you can actually see the foundations going in for the solar panels, so it’s changed quite a bit.”

This is a transformation a lot of cities would envy, but I’m curious why Exelon’s doing this in Chicago and whether it’ll repeat it in other cities. On the first question, O’Neill says Exelon’s putting up the panels because it’s got a plan to cut its own carbon emissions.

“This project here will displace 30 million pounds of greenhouse gases per year. So it is a part of our low-carbon initiative.”

This Chicago solar project qualifies for federal loan guarantees and tax credits, but even with that, it’s not clear Exelon will make a profit. So, the question is: will Exelon repeat this? O’Neill says he’s hopeful.

“It is a demonstration project to show what can be done and with its success will come other successes.”

To get an industry-wide view of whether other cities might get urban solar farms, I talk with Nathaniel Bullard. He analyses solar power markets for New Energy Finance, a consulting firm. Bullard says cities are eager to re-use land that can be an eye-sore, or even cost a city money to maintain. For example, some southwestern cities have old landfills – and they’re planning to put solar farms on top.

“We’ve actually see those go much larger than what’s on the books right now for Exelon.”

Bullard says companies are taking a closer look at solar power because states are mandating utilities buy at least some. And the US Congress changed some tax laws recently. Exelon is taking advantage of that.

“First thing to note in the Exelon project is that it is Exelon itself which is going to own its project. If this was a year ago, they would be purchasing the electricity on contract. Now, with a change in policy, investor-owned utilities is allowed to own the asset itself and take advantage of tax benefit.”

Bullard says we’re likely to see more urban solar projects like Chicago’s – if the technology gets cheaper and government incentives stay in place.

Bullard has this joke about solar power that he swears is true. He says, in the solar industry, the strongest light does not come from sunshine – it comes from government policy.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

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A Look Into Coal Country

  • The filmmakers want more Americans to understand that when we flick on a light switch – it is not a meaningless act. It takes electricity. And that takes coal. (Photo courtesy of Coal Country)

When the Senate picks up debate
on the climate change bill, it
will be – in part – deciding the
future of coal as an energy source
in the U.S. About half the nation’s
electricity currently comes from
coal. And a lot of it comes from
the Appalachian region. A new
documentary film sets out to show
how mining for coal affects the people
who live in Coal Country. Julie Grant
spoke with the film’s producers:

Transcript

When the Senate picks up debate
on the climate change bill, it
will be – in part – deciding the
future of coal as an energy source
in the U.S. About half the nation’s
electricity currently comes from
coal. And a lot of it comes from
the Appalachian region. A new
documentary film sets out to show
how mining for coal affects the people
who live in Coal Country. Julie Grant
spoke with the film’s producers:

Mari-Lynn Evans and Phylis Geller set out to make the movie Coal Country
because they wanted to show how different people are affected by coal
mining.

They found lots of activists, and regular citizens, who would talk with
them. Plenty of people were willing to show the thick black water in their
toilet tanks. They wanted to show the black soot covering their cars.
They wanted to talk about the health problems they live with. And they all
blamed the coal industry.

Evans also wrote to coal supporters – to get their side of the story on
camera. The answer?

“No. That was their response. I sent out requests to the coal industry,
to coal companies and to suppliers of the coal industry.”

Evans brother is a coal miner. He supports mountain top removal.

(sound of explosions)

As we see in the movie, that’s when coal companies blow off the entire
top of a mountain to get to the coal. Many people consider it the most
polluting and environmentally devastating type of mining.

But Evans says not even her own brother would do an interview about it.

“And when I said, ‘why won’t you talk on camera? You feel so
passionately that coal is wonderful and mountaintop removal is actually for
the environment as well as the economy.’ And his response to me always
was, ‘oh I would never speak on camera without getting permission from
the company I work for.’”

The filmmakers heard that a lot. And no coal miners ever did get
permission to talk on camera.

In the movie, we do hear from Don Blankenship, head of Massey Energy. He
spoke at a public hearing about the need to ease environmental restrictions
on coal mining.

“We had nearly 800 employees up ‘til Friday. We had to lay 8 off. I
think that might be just the tip of the iceberg if we don’t our rules
changed how we mine in the state.”

Anti-coal activists at the public hearing explain how the coal companies
use that kind of intimidation to control miners.

“I think people are scared that they will lose their jobs and be flipping
burgers. You look out and that’s all you see. You see mining and
flipping burgers. And, I argue, that the coal companies want it that way.
They want that to be the only option. That’s the only way they could get
support for how they treat their workers and how they treat this land.
This would never happen in a place that wasn’t poor. Never.”

In the movie, some coal miners stand up at the public meeting to defend the
companies they work for. One explains the coal industry has provided him a
good salary.

Miner One: “For the last 14 years, the coal industry has supported myself
and my wife and my 3 children.”

Miner Two: “When the last one of you so-called environmentalists leave
the state, when the rest of us leave for North Carolina, turn out the
lights. Oh, wait a minute, there won’t be no lights. No coal, no
lights.”

(music)

The filmmakers want more Americans to understand that when we flick on a
light switch – it is not a meaningless act. It takes electricity. And
that takes coal.

And, as anti-coal activist Judy Bonds says in the movie, coal is tearing
apart West Virginia.

“It is a civil war; it’s families against families. It’s brother
against brother.”

Or – in the case of filmmaker Mari Lynn-Evans – brother against
sister.

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

Related Links

Green Jobs in the Golden State

  • California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced the biggest state-funded green jobs training program in the nation. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)

California is putting together
a huge green jobs training program.
Lester Graham reports it will mean
thousands of workers trained for a
growing part of the economy:

Transcript

California is putting together
a huge green jobs training program.
Lester Graham reports it will mean
thousands of workers trained for a
growing part of the economy:

Last week, lost in the news of wildfires and state budget problems, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger announced the biggest state-funded green jobs training program in the nation. California is leveraging federal stimulus dollars with state money and public-private partnership matching funds.

“This $75-million program will train more than 20,000 workers for clean and green jobs in the future.”

Green jobs – such as repairing hybrid and electric cars, installing solar panels and building wind turbines.

Governor Schwarzenegger says this Clean Energy Workforce Training Program is where economic growth starts.

“There are still people out there who think that protecting the environment will slow the economy down, but it’s quite the opposite here in California and all over the United States.”

Some business leaders say the green sector likely will be the only growth sector in this economy for a while.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links

A Fight Over the Climate Change Bill

  • Groups are arguing over whether the climate change bill in the Senate will create jobs or kill them. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)

America has a big decision coming up. We have
to decide whether we want to keep spending our
money on energy from fossil fuel sources such as
coal and oil. Or, do we want to invest more in
renewable energy such as solar, wind, and bio-fuels?
Lester Graham reports the next stage for the
national debate will be when the Senate considers
a climate change bill late this month:

Transcript

America has a big decision coming up. We have
to decide whether we want to keep spending our
money on energy from fossil fuel sources such as
coal and oil. Or, do we want to invest more in
renewable energy such as solar, wind, and bio-fuels?
Lester Graham reports the next stage for the
national debate will be when the Senate considers
a climate change bill late this month:

The U.S. House has already passed a version of the bill. It includes a carrot and stick plan to cap greenhouse gas emissions and put a price on them. It will mean fossil fuels will become a little more expensive to use. Revenue from the program will be invested in clean energy and energy efficiency projects.

President Obama’s Secretary of Commerce, Gary Locke, says using that money America can reinvent itself and, in the process, create jobs.

“The technological innovations needed to combat climate change, to reverse it, to mitigate it, can spawn one of the most promising areas of economic growth in the 21st century.”

Environmental groups believe that. And labor unions believe it. And some progressive businesses are counting on it. They’ve been joining forces in groups such as the Apollo Alliance, and then there’s the United Steel Workers Union and the Sierra Club’s Blue/Green Alliance.

Leo Gerard is the President of the United Steelworkers.

“We need a climate change bill that is focused on creating jobs and cleaning up the climate. With a lot of conservation, a lot of investments in the newest technologies, what we’ll end up doing is taking a huge amount of carbon out of the atmosphere and creating a lot of good jobs.”

Business groups say all carbon cap-and-trade will do is make coal, gas and oil more expensive.

“This legislation is a job killer.”

Keith McCoy is a Vice-President with the National Association of Manufacturers. He says the government should not penalize businesses that rely on cheaper fossil fuels.

“So, if you’re a company that’s reliant on natural gas or oil or even coal in the manufacturing process, these companies suffer the most.”

Business says drop cap-and-trade. And just use the carrot. The government should just offer incentives for energy efficiency and invest in technologies such as nuclear power and carbon capture and sequestration for coal-burning industries.

So the two sides are rallying the troops.

The unions and environmental groups are urging their members to push for cap-and-trade for the sake of the planet and for the promise of green jobs.

Business groups are launching TV ad campaigns against it. Oil companies are using a front group called Energy Citizens to hold public rallies oppsing cap-and-trade. They raise the spector of high gasoline prices and higher electricity bills and throw in the threat of losing as many as 2.4 million jobs.

Ed Montgomery is President Obama’s Director of Recovery for Auto Communities and Workers. He says a clean energy policy is not going to hurt the US, it’ll save it.

“Something’s gone wrong. Our manufacturing sector isn’t able, and hasn’t been able to compete and continue to create new and effective jobs. And what a clean energy policy opens up for us is a whole avenue forward. It’s a way to create both new jobs, to open up new avenues of competitiveness, the competitiveness that uses the strengths of our workers – who know how to make product.”

But first, the debate will devolve into shouting matches about whether global warming is real and, if it is, whether cap-and-trade will do anything to slow it. There will be distortions on both sides about the end of the economic good of the country, and the climatic end of the world as we know it.

And because of all the complexities, the arguments will leave a thoroughly confused public about whether we should use government policy to shift from reliance on carbon-emitting fossil fuels to banking more on renewable energy.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

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Job Killer or Job Creator?

  • Environmental groups and labor unions say the climate change bill will create green jobs. Some businesses disagree. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)

The Senate sponsors of a climate change
bill say they need more time. Lester Graham
reports Senators Barbara Boxer and John
Kerry asked the Senate leadership to give
them until the end of the month before they
introduce the climate change bill:

Transcript

The Senate sponsors of a climate change
bill say they need more time. Lester Graham
reports Senators Barbara Boxer and John
Kerry asked the Senate leadership to give
them until the end of the month before they
introduce the climate change bill:

The details of the senate bill are still being worked out. The House version included a carbon cap-and-trade scheme to reduce greenhouse gases and raise revenue for clean energy projects.

Environmental groups and labor unions are in favor of cap-and-trade. Jeff Rickert heads up the AFL-CIO’s Center for Green Jobs.

“The climate change bill is a potential stream of revenue to really make the green jobs, the clen-tech industry a reality.”

Business groups say all carbon cap-and-trade will do is make energy more expensive.

“This legislation is a job killer.”

Keith McCoy is a Vice-President with the National Association of Manufacturers.

“So, if you’re a company that’s reliant on natural gas or oil or even coal in the manufacturing process, these companies suffer the most.”

Business suggests the government should just offer incentives for energy efficiency and invest in clean technologies.

The two sides are taking their arguments to the public this month.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links

Nuclear Careers to Heat Up?

  • Until recently, there hasn’t been an order for a new nuclear plant in 30 years. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)

Some Senate Republicans want the climate
change bill to focus on building new nuclear
power plants. They’re calling for as many as
100 new plants in 20 years. But the industry
has been in decline for so many years now,
there’s concern there might not be enough
nuclear engineers to do the job. Julie Grant
reports:

Transcript

Some Senate Republicans want the climate
change bill to focus on building new nuclear
power plants. They’re calling for as many as
100 new plants in 20 years. But the industry
has been in decline for so many years now,
there’s concern there might not be enough
nuclear engineers to do the job. Julie Grant
reports:

There’s a lot of new interest in nuclear energy and technology these days. But there’s a problem.

The American Nuclear Society estimates they need 700 new nuclear engineers per year to keep up with growing the demand. It’s enough to give long-time nuclear supporters whip-lash. Until recently, things looked gloomy for the nuclear industry.

William Martin is chair of the nuclear engineering department at the University of Michigan. Ten years ago, he says no new plants were being designed or built. And he was having a tough time finding students.

“A student entering the field, what you could tell them was, ‘well, there’s a big focus on waste.’ That’s not hardly something that excites young students to enter the field.”

Martin remembers standing on the stage at graduation in the mid 1990s to call the names of his graduates. Other engineering departments had so many students, it took an hour to call them all. But Martin only had a few names to call.

“Our students trip across in about ten seconds.”

Lots of nuclear engineering programs didn’t make it through the down times. There are less than half the university programs today than there were 30 years ago.

Nuclear got a bad name starting in 1979 – with the meltdown at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania. That was followed by the deadly nuclear accident at Chernobyl, Ukraine in the ‘80s.
By the early 1990s, President Clinton announced he would eliminate funding for nuclear power research and development.

Until recently, there hasn’t been an order for a new nuclear plant in 30 years.

Vaughn Gilbert is spokesman for Westinghouse Electric Company, which focuses on nuclear energy.


He says Westinghouse laid off a lot its engineers in the down years. A decade ago, those who were left were heading toward retirement. So, Gilbert says, the company started working with universities to train engineering students to run its aging nuclear plants.

“Simply because we knew we would need to attract new people to maintain the existing fleet and then also to work with our customers to decommission the plants as they came offline.”

Westinghouse and other nuclear companies started giving lots of money to maintain university programs.

And then, everyone started worrying about climate change – and looking for ways to make energy that wouldn’t create more greenhouse gases. Nuclear power has started making a comeback.

Gilbert says new plants are in the works again – and Westinghouse needs engineers. The company’s designs will be used in six new U.S. plants.

The timing is pretty good for 25 year old Nick Touran. He’s a PhD student in nuclear engineering at the University of Michigan. He knows there’s a negative stigma to nuclear power – because he’s asked people about it.

“I just say, ‘so what do you think about nuclear power?’ Just to passersby on the street. And one person said, ‘I only think one thing – no, no, no, no, no.’”

But Touran says the negative stuff mostly comes from older people. When Three Mile Island melted-down, Touran wasn’t even born yet. He says most people his age are much more accepting of nuclear power.

“It’s the people who remember Three Mile Island and remember Chernobyl and remember World War II, who have all these very negative associations with nuclear weapons and Soviet reactors that were built incredibly wrong. And stuff like that.”

Touran says much of his generation just sees a power source that doesn’t create greenhouse gases.

Of course, there are greenhouse gases created in the process of manufacturing nuclear fuel rods. And then there’s that pesky problem of that spent nuclear waste. There’s still no permanent place to dump it.

Touran says he started studying nuclear power because he was amazed by it. But as the number of students in his department grows, he says more are choosing nuclear because it’s a smart career choice.

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

Related Links

What Counts as Green Collar?

  • President Obama has said that a move toward clean energy production has enormous job creation potential. But some researchers say that’s overblown. (Source: Kmadison at Wikimedia Commons)

At the heart of President Obama’s economic recovery plan is the promise of new green collar jobs. Workers concerned about being laid off from their blue collar jobs are starting to wonder what those new jobs will look like. Julie Grant reports:

Transcript

At the heart of President Obama’s economic recovery plan is the promise of new green collar jobs. Workers concerned about being laid off from their blue collar jobs are starting to wonder what those new jobs will look like. Julie Grant reports:

Michelle Forte has been a dye maker at the General Motors plant in Parma, Ohio for 15 years. She says everyone at work is worried about the future of the plant, and the prospects of the whole company.

“It’s a scary industry to be in right now. They keep on sending our work to China. And my job could be next, you just don’t know. It’s scary to live in that environment every day. You go into work and it’s negative all the time.”

Forte hasn’t gotten a raise in 6 years. And in the future, if she stays as autoworker, she’s going to be making a lot less.

“I will tell you what I made last year, and that was $80,000. And this year, with the concessions that we’ve took and the overtime that we’ve lost, I will be lucky to make $60,000. So, yeah, it’s a drastic cut.”

Forte decided to take advantage of job training money available at GM. She gets up a five in the morning to start work, then after her shift she heads to school.

She and two co-workers have started taking courses at the new Green Academy at Cuyahoga Community College. They’re learning what it takes to install solar panels, wind turbines, and to make buildings energy efficient. It’s tough getting home after 10 at night. But Forte says learning to work in the clean energy field is a positive step for their future.

“Because we wanted to get in on the ground floor. If it breaks open like we think it is, we want to have the education under our belt already.”

But most autoworkers aren’t betting on an explosion of green jobs. At least, they aren’t spending their time in training classes – even if they’ve already been laid off.

Joe Rugola is president of the AFL-CIO of Ohio. The union represents everyone from musicians to office workers to electricians.

Rugola says people who’ve been laid off have to make impossible choices if they decide to start training in a new industry – do they continue looking for jobs to keep the unemployment check coming in – or do they go to school for retraining?

“Am I going to go for training, if I’m already laid off, am I going to risk my unemployment benefits, and go for training in an industry that may or may not produce real work down the road? A person in that situation should not have to make that choice.”

And that’s the big gamble. Do they invest time and effort to retrain for jobs that might never materialize?

President Obama has said that a move toward clean energy production has enormous job creation potential. But some researchers say that’s overblown.

Andrew Dorchak is a researcher with the Case Western Reserve University law library. He coauthored a study titled Green Job Myths.

The first myth: that there is a common understanding of what makes something a green job.

“We’ve figured out that there wasn’t a really good definition of green jobs. Especially if there are political subsidies involved that might be problematic.”

Problematic because many of the jobs classified as green today aren’t making wind turbines and solar panels in the Midwest. They’re lobbyists, administrative assistants, and janitors working for environmental organizations in New York and Washington.

And he’s concerned the definition of green jobs will get even wider as government pockets get deeper.

“It’s subject to maneuvering. To people fighting to classify their jobs as green.”

Dorchak says companies will chase the subsidies. That could take away from government money to create productive jobs.

Jobs that could help people like Michelle Forte find work – and improve the environment at the same time.

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

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Cities Share Cars to Save Cash

  • Cities have started to use car sharing programs in order to save money (Photo by Ed Edahl, courtesy of FEMA)

Car sharing has long been considered a green
alternative to owning a car. Both in terms of
expense and the environment. Companies like
Zipcar have made this concept mainstream in
a lot of urban areas. Now some cities are
trying out car sharing with their municipal
fleets. Tamara Keith has more:

Transcript

Car sharing has long been considered a green
alternative to owning a car. Both in terms of
expense and the environment. Companies like
Zipcar have made this concept mainstream in
a lot of urban areas. Now some cities are
trying out car sharing with their municipal
fleets. Tamara Keith has more:

Karyn LeBlanc works in the Washington DC department of transportation, so maybe it’s not surprising that she was one of the first to try out the city’s FleetShare program.

“It’s this one over here, right here, says 6067 is the license plate on it.”

A white Honda Civic powered by natural gas is waiting for her in a parking lot behind a city office.

She went online to reserve the car and it’s expecting her. At least the very smart computer transponder thingie in the front windshield is expecting her. LeBlanc presses something that looks like a credit card up to the device.

“So, we place this right here and you hear that little click and the car opens.”

The tank is full, the keys are inside, and LaBlanc is off and running.

(sound of driving)

“I would say I use fleetshare 2 or 3 times a week for any meeting that I need to go to or that I need to get to. So I go where I need to go. I park it. I go to my meeting. I get back in the car and I go back to the office.”

For people who use Zipcar this process will sound very familiar. The company has simply brought its car-sharing technology to Washington DC’s municipal fleet.

So far DC has about 60 new cars outfitted with Zipcar gear. But here’s the remarkable thing, those 60 cars are replacing 360. How? The new cars are getting a lot more use than the old ones.

“We’re getting up to 71% utilization on all these cars.”

When we spoke to him, Dan Tangerlini was DC’s Deputy Mayor.

We’re standing in the middle of a municipal parking lot. On one side there are empty spaces where the fleetshare cars park – on the other side there are just a bunch of white city cars.

“You see all this white iron around here. All these DC government vehicles that are kind of sitting static because these are assigned to individuals and those individuals don’t have a reason to be in that vehicle right now.”

Tangherlini says this system will save the city about 6 million dollars over the next five years – which is welcome at a time when budgets are tight.

Which might explain why Scott Griffith’s phone keeps ringing. He’s Zipcar’s CEO and says the company is now in talks with 25 cities.

“They all have the same challenges, not enough tax money, too many cars. They do need to move people around during the day and we’re trying to make that happen in the most efficient way.”

But this isn’t just about money. Griffith says when people share cars they end up driving more efficiently. When they have to book in advance rather than a bunch of individual trips they stack all their stops in one trip.

Car sharing isn’t new for cities like Chicago, San Francisco and Philadelphia. They’ve had programs in place for some time where city workers can use cars loaned out by private car sharing companies. They use the same one the public uses.

Eli Masser helped form the relationship in Philadelphia between the city and the non-profit Philly Car Share which he co-founded.

“One of the benefits of car sharing with municipalities or most businesses for that matter is residential demand is in the evenings and on weekends and most business demand and municipal demand is during the day.”

Which means those cars are busy well beyond the 40 hour work week. Critics say this model is far more efficient than what Zipcar is doing in DC. But Masser says there’s an even better model – a hybrid of DC and Philly.

Ideally cities would have a relatively small city-owned fleet of shared cars and even heavy machinery. But most city workers would car-share with the public.

For The Environment Report, I’m Tamara Keith.

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Will Green Collar Jobs Pay Off?

  • Obama delivering the American Recovery and Reinvestment speech on Thursday, January 8, 2009 (Photo courtesy of the Obama Transition Team)

Some top business leaders
expect there will be only one growth
sector during this recession: energy
efficiency. Some call it the dawning
of the ‘green economy.’ Lester Graham
reports many are calling on the
government to invest heavily to get
the economy going again. But some are
worried that billions will go to ‘make
work’ projects with no long-term gains:

Transcript

Some top business leaders
expect there will be only one growth
sector during this recession: energy
efficiency. Some call it the dawning
of the ‘green economy.’ Lester Graham
reports many are calling on the
government to invest heavily to get
the economy going again. But some are
worried that billions will go to ‘make
work’ projects with no long-term gains:

Just as computers and the information age defined the economy many business leaders believe alternative fuels and energy conservation will define the green economy.

During a recent speech at George Mason University, President-elect Barack Obama indicated he wants to encourage that growth in green collar jobs.

“Jobs building solar panels and wind turbines, constructing fuel-efficient cars and buildings and developing the new energy technologies that will lead to even more jobs, more savings and a cleaner, safer planet in the bargain.”

There’s no doubt that much of President-elect Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan is green.

The AFL-CIO has its own Green Jobs for America Program. The union wants 100-billion dollars of government money to be invested in the kind of jobs Mr. Obama talked about.

Pat Devlin is with the AFL-CIO’s Michigan Building Trades Council. He says he hopes Congress moves on the Obama plan soon.

“We’re hoping ASAP. Were looking to get something kicked off in the next six months. And like I said, we’ve got the projects. We just need the infusion of the investment behind it and we’re ready to go. We got to be smart when we do get the dollars, too. That they’re spent in the right place to get people back to work, get our economy headed in the right direction.”

The AFL-CIO has been talking to the Obama administration… and the union likes what it’s hearing.

President-elect Obama says making buildings and homes more energy efficient will mean jobs now and save billions in natural gas and oil in the future making us less dependent on foreign fossil fuels… and reducing greenhouse gas emissions causing global warming.

But the government has a nasty habit of screwing these things up. Members of Congress want the money for their states even if they don’t have the kind of shovel-ready plans that will mean those kind of long-term benefits and that could sabotage the effort.

“You just can’t throw money at the problems and somehow magically it’s going to work.”

Eric Orts directs the Initiative for Global Environmental Leadership, part of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He says the investments should go to projects that mean more energy and economic efficiencies in the future have long-term benefits that will benefit the economy. Otherwise it’s wasting an opportunity.

“You might create short-term jobs for some time, but that’s not going to lead to the long-term foundation growth that I’m talking about. That’s going to require some intelligent allocation of the funds so you get the payoffs.”

The Obama administration will have to be picky the jobs, very cautious about how the taxpayer money is invested if we’re going to see those payoffs.

For The Environment Report. I’m Lester Graham.

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Turning the Rust Belt Green

  • The creation of 'green-collar' jobs may help the Rust Belt's unemployment problems (Photo by Lester Graham)

The nation’s economy is in decline, and
the middle states that make up the Rust Belt have
been hit particularly hard with job losses. Some
Midwest states have turned to a new type of
manufacturing and the so-called green collar jobs
it creates. Marianne Holland reports:

Transcript

The nation’s economy is in decline, and
the middle states that make up the Rust Belt have
been hit particularly hard with job losses. Some
Midwest states have turned to a new type of
manufacturing and the so-called green collar jobs
it creates. Marianne Holland reports:

Nationwide, just over half the states have passed some sort of laws or incentives geared at
getting green manufacturing jobs. In the nation’s rust belt,
Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois and Ohio already have green policy in place.

Ron Pernick is a co-founder of CleanEdge. That’s a national green manufacturing research
organization. Pernick says those jobs, are in one of the major growth sectors in American
manufacturing. They’re growing at a rate of about 30% each year. In Iowa, property tax abatements are given to green manufacturing. In Illinois, the state has passed laws requiring utilities to get a portion of their energy from wind or solar power. Pernick says public policy translates to more jobs.

“If you think about creating new industry, you can’t export development. You’ve got to
hire local people to put in the wind turbines, to install the solar farms, to put solar on top
of rooftops. And those jobs can never be exported.”

But other states have been slow to change policy to embrace green manufacturing. In Michigan, green energy legislation has been tied up in
the State Senate. An in states like Indiana, there are no laws or business incentives even on the table to attract the green
manufacturing industry.

Indiana State Representative Ryan Dvorak blames the big power companies for lobbying against incentives to create green jobs.

“I’m not sure why they have so much sway in the state with the different legislators but
they don’t want to give up any ground basically. Obviously they make their money by
generating and selling electricity, so any loss in market share, they’re motivated to
stop that legislation.”

The power companies say they’re just looking out for their customers.
Angeline Protegere is a spokesperson for Duke Energy. Protegere says renewable energy is
moving forward without state regulations. She says Duke understands that some day
regulations will come. But she says that will be at a high risk.

“We constantly have to balance our environmental responsibilities with our economic
responsibilities to our customers because they pay for the cost of pollution control
through their bills.”

And the power companies’ lobbyists persuade legislators it’s in the best interests of the people to block incentives for green jobs. Representative Dvorak thinks his colleagues are being misled.

Jesse Kharbanda is with the Hoosier Environmental Council. He says in his state and others that ignore the green jobs opportunity, workers are being left behind.

“We’re obviously in this situation where Indiana has historically had a formidable
manufacturing base and that base has been continuously eroded because of globalization.
We’re not in any time going to fundamentally change Indiana’s economy and so we have
to deal with the labor force as it is. We have a good, technically minded labor base, but
the question is: what sectors are we creating in the state to employ that technical labor
base. And one of them ought to be the green technology sector.”

Kharbanda says it’s a state’s public policy, tax breaks, and other incentives that will attract the
most green collar jobs. Without those incentives, unemployed factory workers in Rust Belt
states will have to hope for some kind of recovery in manufacturing, or take lower paying, service sector jobs.

For The Environment Report, I’m Marianne Holland.

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